Opening Presentation:
Iain Glover
Regional Head of Business
Development, NatWest Business
Banking

Kalpna Woolf
Author, Entrepreneur and
Broadcaster

Matt West
Entrepreneurial Development
Manager, eSPARK

Della Hudson BSc, FCA
Hudson Business Accountants and
Advisers.

!

Networking and exhibition

End of event

Minal Patel
Marketing by Minal

Presentations from:
Q&A
Cllr Asher Craig
Cabinet Member for
Neighbourhoods
Cllr Claire Hiscott
Cabinet Member for Education and
Skills
Cllr Afzal Shah
Council Lead on Small Business

www.nbwn.org

Closing comments

Speakers and
timings subject to change

www.natwest.com/business

IAIN GLOVER
Regional Head of Business Development, South West & Wales,
Business Banking at NatWest
Iain is an accomplished and passionate leader, currently working
with a team of Business Growth Enablers, Relationship
Managers and local Directors to support small businesses,
delivering business expertise and supporting customers achieve
their business and personal ambitions. Iain is an advocate of
Women in Business, having an excellent gender mix across his
teams.
Iain has worked for NatWest for 30 years across personal,
private and business banking in the South West and Wales,
having started his career in the branches of Somerset and since
undertaken various Area and Regional Manager roles.
Iain is a local Councillor in is home village of Ponthir and Lower
Llanfrechfa , South Wales, where he also is a keen volunteer
supporting his community and neighbours.

SONIA BROWN MBE
Sonia is a business communicator, brand strategist, diversity
maverick and uber connector. She has over 20 years in marketing,

IAIN
GLOVER
@IAINGLOVER

branding and life skills development. She is an authority on many
areas of business, leadership, sales and marketing, as well as
supporting individuals to achieve success in all areas of life.

She founded the National Black Women’s Network; Let’s Talk
Business Networking Forum and Sistatalk the UK’s leading online
forum for women looking to connect with leading companies,
decision makers and industry peers. More recently she launched the
Inspirational Women’s Super Summit at the Scottish Parliament,
Edinburgh and designed EVOLVE; a six-step business growth
programme aimed at solo and micro entrepreneurs.

Sonia has successfully worked with the who’s who in business
and is endorsed by government departments and ministers,
leading banks and financial institutions including top FTSE
companies as well as working with a number of high profile
champions to build alliances between entrepreneurs,
government and banks. She was a member of the GLE One
London Start Up and Growth Panel; MOD Diversity Champions
Panel and MOPAC Task Force; as well as sitting on the British
Bankers Association (BBA) Diversity and Inclusion Panel.

Sonia was the former business editor for New Nation and the Voice
Newspaper, the UKs leading paper for the Black British community.
She contributes to a number of radio shows, magazines and
newspapers on women, diversity and enterprise issues.

Sonia was named one of the Top 50 diversity figures in public life on
the Economist Global List and is the International Alliance for Women
(TIAW) 2015 World of Difference 100 Award Recipient for the
economic empowerment of women. She contributes to a number of
radio shows, magazines and newspapers on women, diversity and
enterprise issues.

www.nbwn.org

SONIA
BROWN MBE
@SONIATALKS | @NBWNTALKS

www.natwest.com/business

The Inaugural launch of the Connected
Woman Panel Discussion took place in
November 2016. The night was made up of a
diverse mix of entrepreneurs, professionals
and industry experts from a wide spectrum of
industries.
Organised by the NBWN and hosted by
NatWest Business Banking; the evening
provided an opportunity for the audience to hear
from an array of award winning entrepreneurs
who took time out of their busy diaries to share
their business journey with this receptive
audience.
Iain Glover, Regional Head of Business
Development, NatWest Business Banking kick
started the evening by highlighting the support
that the bank offers to SMEâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s in the local area.
As well as regular bank products and services,
Iain advised the audience that the bank is now
providing services tailored to women including
accredited Women in Business specialists who
work alongside his team of 14 business growth
enablers.

Our audience heard useful information, advice and supported
needed to turn their small business, or stagnant career into a
successful endeavour. In addition they were treated to
entertainment from professional singer songwriter Kizzy Morrell.

www.nbwn.org

Sonia Brown MBE (founder, NBWN and
Sistatalk) wanted women to recognise that they
bring different approaches to business and
could benefit from the information, ideas and
inspiration the panel had to offer. The panellists
were brutally honest about their successes and
struggles;both personally and in business,
which ensured attendees were left in no doubt
about what it took to start, manage and grow
their business and careers.
There was a cross representation of panelists
from different sectors of the economy. This
provided a mixture of learnings and lessons on
the night. The main focus was around the
topics of mentoring, emotional intelligence,
personal branding and professional
development.
The Connected Woman: Business Impact and
Leadership panel discussion aims to educate,
empower and enable women to leverage their
skills; maximise their leadership potential; climb
the corporate ladder and develop trusted
networks that help women to stand out in
todayâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s highly competitive marketplace!

There was plenty of networking taking place on the night,
Attendees were able to mix with colleagues, business experts, like
minded entrepreneurs and professionals over canopies.

www.natwest.com/business

CLLR ASHER CRAIG
Asher has over 30 years experience as a community activist,
leader, management consultant and now politician. She has
championed the needs of the voice-less, with a particular
emphasis on the social-economic development of BME and
under-represented communities. She has led and Chaired a
number of major partnerships and organisations at local,
regional and national level and has worked in the field of
employment & training, education & skills, recruitment,
advocacy, equality & diversity within local government and
third sector.
Asher was elected as the Labour Councillor for the ward of St
George West, Bristol in May 2016 and was appointed to the
Cabinet with the wide reaching portfolio of Neighbourhoods in
August 2016.
In March 2017 Asher was asked to step into the new role of
Deputy Mayor – Communities, bringing into & elevating the
issue of Public Health within this new portfolio.

ASHER
CRAIG
@CLLRASHERCRAIG

Asher is also school governor, the proud mother of 3
daughters and follows the Rastafari faith.

CLLR CLAIRE HISCOTT
Claire Hiscott is a Bristol City councillor, with the portfolio of
Education and Skills on the Mayors Cabinet.
She came into politics in 2013 after winning her first local
election - which she agreed to run in 'just for the experience'.
Claire stood as a parliamentary candidate for in the 2015
General election for the same reason.
A Pharmacist by profession she has spent 25 years in the front
line of the NHS, with a focus on public health and sits on the
Bristol Health and Wellbeing Board. She took a break from the
health service while her children were young and started her
own small business running art classes for children from her
own home which then expanded into a church hall. Claire has
also spent many years working in the voluntary sector.
Now with the Education and Skills portfolio, Claire draws on her
experience and understanding of the inequalities in the city, her
previous work with children and young people and her local
business links.
In her spare time Claire is a trustee for the Bristol Old Vic theatre,
an addicted cinema goer and a lover of coastal swimming.

CLAIRE
HISCOTT
@CLAIREHISCOTT

www.nbwn.org

www.natwest.com/business

CLL AFZAL SHAH
Councillor Afzal Shah, Bristol City Council Lead for Small
Business and Enterprise
My role is to be a strong advocate for small businesses, and
help ensure Bristol is the best place in Britain for
entrepreneurs to start, grow and employ. I am keen to ensure
inclusive growth, and am committed to working towards
establishing a strategic roadmap for Bristol's small
businesses.

AFZAL
SHAH
@@CLLAFZALSHAH

CHRIS PRESTON
Chris is NatWestâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s Regional Managing Director for Business
Banking for South West & Wales.
Chris has worked for NatWest for 31 years, holding various roles
across retail, private, commercial and business banking. He has
worked his way up from frontline level and has held leadership
positions for the past 12 years.
He is West Country-born and bred and now lives in Plymouth
with his wife and their three teenaged daughters. Together they
enjoy outdoor pursuits including horse-riding and just walking the
family dog. When heâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s not working, Chris can also often be found
lending a hand on the farm run by his parents-in-law

CHRIS
PRESTON
@CHRISPRESTON99

www.nbwn.org

www.natwest.com/business

MATT WEST
Matt is the Entrepreneur Development Manager for NatWest in
Bristol.
Matt works as part of NatWest’s Entrepreneurship team,
supporting Entrepreneurs by creating opportunities to scale and
grow through leveraging local internal and external contacts,
making NatWest the go-to place for Entrepreneur support.
A key part of Matt’s role is working closely with Entrepreneurial
Spark, who together with NatWest, have created the world’s
largest free accelerator programme for startup businesses. This
four stage programme supports Entrepreneurs at a variety of
stages on their startup/scaleup journey through mind-set
coaching, subject-specific mentoring and access to a vast
network, with the overall goal of making Entrepreneurs credible,
backable and investible.
During his time at University, Matt took on management of the
family Coffee House, supporting the business to grow to 16
members of staff before sale in August 2014.

MATT
WEST
@MJWEST1992

DELLA HUDSON
Della Hudson is the owner and director of Hudson Business
Accountants and Advisers. Like many women Della left the
corporate world to start her business from the kitchen table whilst
working around two young children. 8 years later Della now
heads a team of 8 and still manages to run the business on 25
hours a week (most of the time).
As a Chartered Accountant and business owner with experience
of running large and small businesses Della’s company
specialises in growing businesses through a broad range of
advice and training workshops. Della is passionate about
business scorecards (how else will you know if you’re
“winning”?) of which accounts are just one measure.

DELLA
HUDSON
@HUDSONACCOUNTAN

www.nbwn.org

www.natwest.com/business

MEL BOUND
Mel has over 20 years experience in sports marketing and brand
engagement delivering high profile campaigns for UK Athletics,
BBC Sport, Reebok & Commonwealth Games as well as a
range of corporate clients. She founded multi award winning This
Mum Runs in 2015 after struggling to get back into exercise after
having kids. A Mum of two, she is passionate about empowering
women everywhere to be healthier, particularly women who have
never exercised before or believe they can't. She completed a
successful crowdfunding campaign last year, hitting her target in
just 10 days and of her 370 investors, 80% were female. She
has launched her own women and kids clothing range and has
kickstarted plans to roll This Mum Runs out across the UK.
She was recently appointed as a global ambassador for
Facebook's 'She Means Business' Campaign, won the Women
in Business ‘New Business 2017’ Award, has been shortlisted for
the Women's Sports Trust 'Be a Game Changer' Awards and is
listed in the Sunday Time's 'Maserati 100 Disrupter Brands'
2017. She still does the school run with her kids every day.

MEL
BOUND
@THISMUMRUNS

MINAL PATEL
Minal started Marketing by Minal in March 2016 to help small
and medium sized businesses (SMEs) give their marketing more
focus. With over 15 years’ experience in marketing, Minal has
worked for numerous UK-based and international companies in
senior marketing roles.
Her last position gave her the opportunity to get to know 100s of
SMEs across the UK and a real passion for helping them
achieve great results from marketing was born. In the first year of
business, Marketing by Minal was selected as one of the Small
Business 100 for the Small Business Saturday campaign and
Minal was named in the list of 100 women marketers to follow on
Twitter.
Based in Hillingdon, Minal loves sharing her marketing
knowledge in a practical and easy-to-implement way.

MINAL
PATEL
@MINAL2804

www.nbwn.org

www.natwest.com/business

ALEKA GUTZMORE
Aleka Gutzmore is Director of A G Finance HUB Ltd and founder
of the Financial HUG™ Money Program.
As well as a successful career in banking and financial services,
Aleka has dedicated herself to knowledge sharing and
networking. She is a passionate and highly motivated speaker, a
dedicated blogger and ensures that her time is spent
encouraging others to succeed with a particular interest in
female business owners and families.
Aleka brings over a decades’ business experience and a huge
amount of passion and enthusiasm which guarantees something
new and dynamic to offer women area the topic of financial
management.
Aleka gives all her clients a Financial HUG™ which she
describes as honest, unique and genuine advise ensuring
standards are kept high and the clients aspirations are at the
front of the agenda. In her spare time Aleka loves all things
creative especially knitting and is kept on her toes with a
teenaged son.

ALEKA
GUTZMORE
@ALEKAGUTZMORE

KALPNA WOOLF
For over 20 years Kalpna worked in television production for the
BBC, rising to Head of Production overseeing many of the BBC’s
food series like Nigel Slater’s Simple Suppers, Food and Drink
and Nigellissima, as well as managing the BBC’s landmark
natural history and factual series such as Frozen Planet,
Antiques Roadshow and Countryfile.
Alongside food writing, she has launched food festivals, judged
food awards and is curating the rich food stories and recipes of
the 91 language communities of Bristol.
She is Chair of Trustees for Frank Water (a charity which saves
lives by providing clean water solutions in India), a Visiting
Professor at the University of West of England, Board Member of
the Local Enterprise Partnership in Bristol and a trustee for
Knowle West Media Centre (helping under-privileged youngsters
to get experience to start media careers).
When not working, writing, cooking or looking after her family,
she is a keen runner and keeping fit. Kalpna completed a half
Marathon and has running a full Marathon firmly in her sights
next!
She won the Asian Woman of Achievement Media Award in
2013.